Event Category: Exhibition

ABOUT THE EXHIBITION: Over the course of 3 years sab’s sketchbook was an intimate exhalation of diaristic navigation, and it is through the vulnerability allowed in a closed-circuit space like a sketchbook, where one can truly be contained and mapped out for all nuances. Approximately 30 drawings chosen from various sketchbooks, document the process of becoming and unbecoming as it relates the instability of mental health when moving through various stages in life. When the viewer encounters these maps of space created to communicate vulnerability, resilience and movement beyond, they are invited to occupy and reinterpret it as needed. This is an intimate display to create an empathetic connection with the intention of healing, to provide visual space of refuge and restitution, away from a place of pain, something new altogether rather than a reaction alone. In showcasing the process of navigation one is also able to see themselves, to allow the process to change oneself rather than whether the aspirational goal is ever met.

The show will feature sculptural work that acts as private anchor points, and two new works that were drawn as a result of this inner work, that have not yet been publicized anywhere, as a tone to set for the unfolding that happens once the process has reached a pressure point in trajectory.

All events associated with this exhibit will be barrier-free and will have ASL interpretation. We request that you help us make this event scent-free. This is a FREE event.

The artist thanks the Ontario Arts Council for generously supporting this work.

DIRECTIONS: Tangled Vitrines are located outside studio 30 on the basement level of the 401 Richmond Building. The accessible subway stations are at Union Station and Spadina Station. 401 Richmond can also be accessed by Streetcar by taking the 510 Spadina streetcar from Spadina subway station or the 510 Richmond Street stop going north from Union Station, which is intermittently accessible.

Own Your Cervix by Vanessa Dion Fletcher is an interactive installation that uses menstrual blood to physically and metaphorically create a gendered space reflecting on what defines our bodies. In this boundary-pushing show, Dion-Fletcher uses installation and performance to invite us all to think about how our bodies, and the ways we think about our bodies are marked and defined, challenging a medical or anthropological lens.

Textiles, pattern and the athletics of beauty become the backdrop for self-examination in the context of a feminist decolonial discourse.

As part of the exhibition, audiences will be invited to participate in private self-examination sessions, guided by the artist. All persons with or without a cervix are welcome to participate. Materials and instruction will be provided in the privacy of a 30-minute individual appointment.

Accessibility:
This exhibition features audio description for all works and will also have multiple tactile pieces. All events associated with this exhibit will be barrier-free and will have ASL interpretation. We request that you help us make this event scent-free. This is a FREE event.

Directions:
Tangled Art Gallery is located in studio 122 on the main floor of the 401 Richmond Building. The accessible subway stations are at Union Station and Spadina Station. 401 Richmond can also be accessed by Streetcar by taking the 510 Spadina streetcar from Spadina subway station or the 510 Richmond Street stop going north from Union Station, which is intermittently accessible.

About Creative Users

Creative Users is an artist collective that engages the work and ideas of artists, activists, and community members to critically explore social and cultural understandings of accessibility through the process of dissecting what it means to be a “user” in the environments we inhabit. We play with the word “user,” a term used in inclusive design practices wherein disabled people are commonly referred to as “extreme users.”

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Creative Users is a disability-led artist platform that explores the intersection of art and design practices, accessibility, and disability. Creative Users is a shapeshifter, cultural connector and sector builder of disability arts and accessible curatorial practice. Our work stems from a desire to activate art and make visible an inclusive arts culture.

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Inclusive practices are integral to everything we do at Creative Users. As a disability-led initiative, our approach to inclusion is informed by our ongoing collective experience of difference and disability as well as by our steadfast belief that an inclusive culture is a richer culture.